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Bastien und Bastienne takes up the plot of the little French opera Le devin du village (The Village Soothsayer) by the philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau. The "soothsayer" Colas, a wise old shepherd, advises the unhappy shepherdess Bastienne to secure the love of the fickle Bastien by arousing his jealousy. The despairing Bastien then also seeks advice from Colas, who pretends to use magic to bring the two lovers together again. Der Schauspieldirektor revolves around an impresario's problems in assembling a group of singers for a performance.

With Die Entführung aus dem Serail and Die Zauberflöte, Mozart made immortal contributions to the genre of the German Singspiel - German-language opera with spoken dialogues. But in the course of his career, Mozart also wrote two short German-language works that are different in musical craftsmanship, but both utterly delightful: Bastien und Bastienne, K. 50, one of Mozart's earliest dramatic works, and Der Schauspieldirektor (The Impresario), K. 486, a mature work written at the same time as Le nozze di Figaro.

Entrusting the two operas to the world-famous Salzburg Marionette Theater for the Mozart 22 cycle was perfectly natural, especially since Bastien und Bastienne was the very first work staged by this theater at its inaugural performance in 1913. Nevertheless, Thomas Reichert, responsible for the stage direction, sets and costumes, hit upon a truly brilliant idea: instead of performing one piece after the other, he combined Bastien und Bastienne and Der Schauspieldirektor in a way that captures the world of the Singspiel in Mozart's day. Here the impresario is still holding auditions, but now he's casting the Singspiel Bastien und Bastienne. Finding a Bastien is easy, but two potential Bastiennes sing their arias so well that the impresario can't decide. He makes a run-through of Bastien und Bastienne, after which the women continue to argue about who should get the role. The clever impresario hopes to squirm his way out by hiring both, one as the A-cast and one as the B-cast. But this only provokes a new quarrel about who will sing at the premiere...

Led by its founder Elisabeth Fuchs, the Junge Philharmonie Salzburg and a cast of fresh young singers provide the spirited, light-hearted music to this charming double fill.